Color Wheel
by Artemis of the Ice
Summary: [new piece: Silhouette] On a color wheel called life...people thrive and survive. [Now a Collection of unrelated oneshots and reaction drabbles by Artemis. UxY, JxA, OxA included]
1. Color Wheel

Season Two has me unbelievably re-interested in Code Lyoko, though I'd fallen out of interest last year; so despite having incredible amounts of real-life issues preventing me from writing much, I had to at least write this to prove that I've regain inspiration. …Sort of.

Oh, and with the events of Season Two, _Every Step I Willed _(my chaptered CL story, available in my profile) is now an Alternate Universe story. Is anyone at all still interested in my continuing it? I have half of chapter four written, if so.

Set slightly in the future; mild speculation-fic.

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He found it most ironic that the time when they could best be together, when there were no barriers, no pretenses, no confusing bundles of issues with other people—

(_like William, _he gritted. _Like Sissy, _she groaned. The other two were discordant on their color wheel, out of place and jarring. And at the same time, both Ulrich and Yumi knew that they were excuses, because even Odd had smacked them both upside their heads one day and told them to "kiss and make out—I mean, make up."

Clearly, they still hadn't.)

--was when they were fighting.

For one- fighting back-to-back, in danger of cruel and unusual and very much virtualized deaths.

But they complemented each other so well, you see. She made up for his short-range deficiencies, his work on the ground alternated with her dominance of the air, and their matching speed and agility only made them a more formidable pair. Take the crab: he got the legs, she got the eye-symbol. Where he couldn't reach, she reached for him. When she couldn't keep up with it, he did it for her. While he dispatched targets with swiftness, it was her limber form that found the openings. Easy and simple. Caught up in the heat of battle, she could smile at him and he could smile back at her without either of them being interrupted by anything—well, other than malicious programming bits out to erase both their existences.

(Thusly proving that dealing with real people is much harder than dealing with life-threatening situations.)

For two- even back in the real world, they were most comfortable in the fight. (Not to mention, it scared nearly everyone else away.) They could be found sparring on a daily basis. Their relationship sounded beautiful set to the rhythm of kick, parry, dodge, roundhouse, uppercut, block, backflip, left hook, "Ow, that's going to bruise like heck in the morning."

Jeremie shook his head and called them abusive. Odd cuffed him on the shoulder and raised their favorite ages-old adage. (Opposites go well together.)

And then he asked him good-naturedly if what he and Aelita did wasn't the same, if only mental sparring.

That much was true. Those two tossed trivia back and forth like a well-worn hackey-sack, and exchanged bits of information reflexively. They had computer programming skills on par with each other (and honestly, with a great deal of the technology industry as well. Somewhere on the other side of the world, Bill Gates shivered.); their natural environment was knowledge and surrounded by it, they mutually thrived. Most couples cuddled in cafés on street corners and parks.

(Odd cursed his relatively lesser intelligence at times like this, but it made no difference- for on the color wheel that was life, the color that he was couldn't match hers.)

They'd more likely be found in a library—tea could be spilled on their work accidentally, and they found no reason to go to the park unless it was to collect samples and find a good place to theorize and scrutinize (and avoid the Hermitage because after all was said and done, dead memories should remain dead).

Likes attracted as well.

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.  
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.:some colors, you see, are complementary  
because love is your canvas and every color adorns it:.

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Revised, 29 September '05. Thanks for reading!


	2. Silhouette

I'm a frustrated CL fan, now, after the past few episodes. (Yumi, stop being so obstinate!) Despite my loads of work and time constraints—those being why _Every Step I Willed _still hasn't been updated—I can't resist the urge to write reaction pieces to some things.

So _Color Wheel _is now officially a drabble/one-shot series. It's likely that none of these pieces will be related directly (aside from involving color, because it's a theme I like), and they won't be exceptionally long.

Reaction piece to ep. 35 "The Chips Are Down"; messing with Odd's thoughts, because I've newly gained a soft spot for him. Poor guy.

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Silhouette

"Imagine how you would feel if something happened to Jeremie," he offers, and he knows he is utterly lost.

How else can he explain why he's so struck by the little blush that skitters across her cheeks every time he teases her? Even though it means that he has to mentally backhand the part of his mind that wishes that she was blushing because of his glance and something wrenches uncomfortably in his gut when he does so, it's worth it to see the shade of pink that crawls up her face, complementing that hair of hers.

The hair! That, too. It's pink, and unearthly in its quality. Who has pink hair? But it only makes her look more like a faerie, an untouchable sprite of the forest, something not of this mortal coil (and he considers her an angel, complete with the voice for it when she molds the landscape of the digital realm, hands clasped in front of her) as if her ears weren't enough to bring that effect about.

He doesn't deserve her, though. Jeremie, mind as quick as lightning and then some, has devoted the better part of a year to Aelita before she was more than a puzzling bundle of data and mysteries. They work well together, Pierre and Marie Curie all over again, albeit infinitely more modernized and somewhat younger. He can't take her from his friend, can't do that to him, and it's the bespectacled boy that her affections lie with, anyway.

(Another small part of him argues that it doesn't matter, that he should be able to make a move if he wishes to, but it's overridden by his mind. Dogs aren't the only loyal creatures—cats are, too.)

So he takes what he can get, caterwauling about his chemistry homework and savoring study sessions without crossing the line that borders his role. It's quite a bit easier to learn that periodic table, curse Mendeleev in his grave, when it's being explained in that deliciously soft-spoken voice.

He's never betrayed his feelings once, even when her arms snake around his waist as she holds on while they're zipping through Lyoko on his board and he bites his lip to keep himself from leaning back into the innocent embrace. He's the ever-vigilant bodyguard, the light-hearted jokester who's there to coax a smile out of that elfish face when it's creased by worry, the faithful friend who watches over her when Jeremie's not around to do so. He will be the guardian in the shadows, a cat's silhouette thrown against the wall behind her light. He's perfectly content to remain in servitude to her because that's the most he can do.

It's not for nothing that he calls her 'princess'.

But he is not her prince and he knows it, and he settles for stretching himself out on the bed beside the spot where she sits with that queasy feeling (and a pang in his chest) and when she asks why he would say such a thing, he answers honestly that he likes making her blush.

Even if it's not for him.

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.:purple was favorite but he now considers the upsides of pink:.

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Thanks for all of the reviews and the warm welcome back! I appreciate each one of them immeasurably.

I apologise if I've affronted some J/A supporters, but I couldn't ignore this idea. One-sided Odd/Aelita is so touching.

Also, I go by some of the original French name spellings, therefore Jeremie has an 'ie' at the end of his. (Though Herb's still Herb, because that's amusing.)


End file.
